Hey everyone. I listened to this song the other day after watching Aliens in a Spaceship and I thought it might work for a fic. It's probably a little late for a post-Aliens fic, but to hell with it. I'm doing one anyway.

Song is "Tell You Something" by Alicia Keys. Fabulous song.

Disclaimer: Nup, still don't own Bones.

He kneels next to her, deep in prayer, trying to get the image of her hand emerging from the dirt out of his head for just a second so he can thank God for saving her…and everyone else. Particularly himself. When they’d run out of time...God he’d been so angry. He hadn’t been that angry in years. He’d comforted himself with the thought that Bones and Hodgins were squints, but the thought of never seeing them againterrified him. And now, feeling her sitting beside him most likely conducting some silent anthropological study…

It feels like the best feeling in the world.

He prays that he finds the son of a bitch that did this to her. To them. Of course, he manages to put the request in much kinder words. The meaning’s all the same though, and he can’t help thinking that this is one kill he might not mind carrying out. He sits up in frustration, unable to stop the ungodly thoughts running through his head and looks at her for a second. It’s clear she hasn’t found any deep meaning in being in this place, but he doesn’t care. She’s beside him, spouting off some anti-Christianity argument and he’s happier than he’s been in days.

She asks what the smell is, and he points out the candles, holding back a shudder. He could have been here for a completely different reason, lighting one of those candles each for her and Hodgins. She studies them the way she studied the dolphin at her mother’s grave. Like they’re something else she can’t understand, but desperately wants to. He doesn’t want to ever let go of that look.

She looks at him and he looks at her, trying desperately to memorize her face again. He can already close his eyes any time he likes and see her eyes, her lips, her cheekbones, he can trace every damn line, but he has to memorize it again. He’s terrified he’s going to forget. That one day he’s going to wake up and not know exactly what shape her lips form when she smiles.

“Ready to go Bones?” He asks, expecting her to get up immediately and lecture him about how God is an invisible being and can’t possibly have any real influence on this church other than what’s in people’s minds. He was wrong. She grabs his arm gently, forcing him to stay where he is.

“Just…one more minute.” She looks around, trying to take everything in at once. He doesn’t voice the teasing comment on the tip of his tongue. She looks far too deep in thought to even hear him and he doesn’t want to take that look away. Not when she’s at peace in her mind for the first time today.

She doesn’t blink once as she looks at the rows and rows of pews, the candles, the stained glass, the altar. If he didn’t know her any better, he’d say she was mystified. Instead, he knows she’s just taking her time observing a culture. Her face is concentrated, like she’s looking at an ancient burial site. He knows she doesn’t believe in any of it, but she’s intrigued anyway, and when she looks back at him, she seems content with her conclusion.

As they’re walking out of the church, he knows he’d quite happily sit with her in church every single day if he could just keep her by his side for the rest of his life.

Just a simple conversation
Just a moment is all it takes

He takes her home and walks her to her door despite the fact she’s insists she can take care of herself. He wants to stay. He desperately wants to stay. It’s in his eyes, but she can’t read people, so she opens the door and says goodbye. He holds the door. She looks confused.

He doesn’t want to say goodbye.

But she still can’t read him, still can’t see him silently pleading. So asks her lightly – almost jokingly – if she wants any Thai food. When she hesitates, she turns on the charm smile, and it works. It always does. She lets him in, and he’s so happy to see her apartment for a good reason. Lately he’s been petrified that he’d have to clear it out and sort through everything, breathe in her perfume at every corner and try not to break down. God, he’s so happy that she’s home and he’s there and they’re back to normal. Back to having Thai food and listening to Foreigner.

They order the food and sit on her couch, arm lengths apart. It’s suddenly uncomfortable. He knows she’s thinking about the car, running out of air. It’s not the situations that are terrifying, it’s being alone with your thoughts afterwards. He knows. He’s been through it. Admittedly, he’s never been buried alive, but he’s been stuck for hours with his thoughts of her being buried alive, and they were bad enough.

She stands abruptly and announces she’s going to have a shower. He knows it’s just to get away from him. They cleaned her up good at the hospital, but he nods his head and smiles telling her she owes him for the Thai food that’ll be arriving any moment. Her smile back is awkward and she rushes off.

A few minutes later he hears the shower running. He can hear a faint humming too, and he smiles at the fact that she sings in the shower. It’s yet another thing he would never have found out about her if the day had ended differently. He sighs and rubs his head. She really needs a TV. Some corny game show would be great right now. He needs to be distracted from the thought of never knowing everything about her.

He wants to know everything. He wants to know that she sings in the shower, he wants to know if she hates or loves Brussels sprouts, what cereal she eats for breakfast, what she looks like after a full karate practice…everything. Even the things a partner probably shouldn’t know. Like what she looks like the second she wakes up in the morning.

The Thai food delivery guy interrupts his thoughts. Paying quickly, he sat the containers down on the table next to the couch, took off his jacket, tossed it over the armrest and sat down. He smiled at the smell of the food. He’d even ordered extra fried rice and crab so there wouldn’t be any disputes.

As if she’d sensed the presence of food, Bones stopped out of her bedroom in a pair of jeans and a hooded sweatshirt. She looked refreshed, if slightly unnerved. Though at the same time, she looks like she could just crawl into bed and stay there for days. He wants to skip the food and guide her straight back to her bed and tell her to sleep…and that he’ll be there to wake her up from the terror of any nightmare.

They eat for a few minutes in silence. It’s awkward. He hates it when they’re awkward. There’s no comment about the extra crab or fried rice and he wants to break the silence, but that could end up being even more awkward. So he sits and eats, looking at her occasionally just to make sure she’s really there. She catches him looking more than once and after about the fifth time, she makes a comment.

“Stop looking at me Booth.” He wants to. He really does. He wants to assure himself that she’ll be there to look at tomorrow and he doesn’t need to overdo it tonight.

“Bones, you’re anything but fine. You were trapped-” She cuts him off with a look that isn’t harsh like he’s used to, but pleading.

“I know. I know what happened today, but I really, really don’t need some psychological evaluation. I haven’t been rendered insane by being buried.” He looks at his rice in thought. Maybe she doesn’t need reassurance, but he does.

“I know. I’m sorry.” He looks at her. “But you need to talk about it. I don’t care whether you do it tomorrow, next week or next month, but you need to Bones.” She takes a breath.

“Are you speaking from experience?” He wants to give her a glare and end her train of thought, but the fact that she’s been through so much today stops him. An argument would just make things worse and that’s so far from what he wants. So taking a leaf out of her book, he tries honesty.

“Yeah.” She looks slightly taken aback and he can’t help but explain. “It’s fine at first, you know? It feels kind of healthy not to talk about it. As if it’ll just go away.” He puts his chopsticks down. “But it never does, Bones. Never. It just hurts. But when you talk to someone…they’re there to kind of ease that pain before you get in over your head.”

She looks at him strangely, and he knows that even though she hates psychology, she can see the double meaning in his words - the silent request for her to let him be there for her. To ease her pain. She takes a deep breath and closes her eyes. When she opens them he sees her fighting some sort of internal battle.

“Soon, Booth. You deserve to know. But I…”

“It’s okay Bones. You don’t have to-”

“I do. Just not tonight. Maybe tomorrow.” He nods, knowing it probably won’t be tomorrow either, but she’s Bones and there’s no use shrinking her now.

After a few minutes more of comfortable silence, she speaks. “I knew you’d find us Booth.” Then she gets up, slips a folded piece of paper over to him and walks away, presumably to her room.

I'm gonna tell you something
Show you something
Won't wait till it's too late

He knows without thinking that it’s a goodbye note. It’s slightly grimy, and the paper’s ripped. His last name has been scribbled in a hurry. He takes a shaky breath, not really wanting to read it. It’s a goodbye note after all, and there was no goodbye today. He never wants to tell her goodbye. Yet his hand is drawn to the paper and he can’t help opening it. She wanted him to read it after all.

Booth,

Hodgins asked me whether I wanted to say goodbye to anyone while we still had a moment left. I don’t quite know what to say. I don’t want to write a goodbye note anymore than you probably want to read one, but I know that you deserve this much. I would have given anything for a note like this fifteen years ago.

I know you won’t stop looking. Not even if we die down here. You don’t give up on much, if anything at all. We’ve been trying for hours to extend our air supply, to give you time. Hodgins managed to pull some air “out of thin air” and we’ll keep trying. But that probably isn’t what you want to read about.

I’ve been told I’m far more articulate on paper than when I speak, but this is a lot harder for me than writing a novel or a report. I don’t know how to say goodbye, Booth. Not when I don’t accept this as a farewell. I’ve seen what you do everyday. I’m not ready to give up and I don’t think you’re ready either. Then again, I’ve never been one for psychology.

If this does reach you and I’m dead, don’t hold yourself responsible. I know you wouldn’t have given up. I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you goodbye to your face. You deserve so much more than a note like this. So much more. More than I can write down on the first page of my novel. You’re a great friend, Booth, and I don’t know if I believe in love as such, but being buried alive can make a person slightly irrational and maybe it is irrational, but you’re more than a friend to me Booth, and if I can’t believe in love, I can at least believe in this feeling I have for you.

If I do die down here, you’re one of the three people I’d miss the most. Tell Russ and Angela that I’m sorry, and I’ll miss them.

I’d say goodbye, but I’m not ready. So this is more like a “see you when I can breathe fresh air”.

Yours,

Bones

He finishes the letter and immediately folds it along the lines of the designated creases. He’s never going to read it again for as long as he lives. He wants to rip it up, but he doesn’t have that right and it’s killing him. All of it’s just killing him…her words, the sight of the damn note, the feelings running through his blood. He’s angry and he’s upset and he’s so completely in love. He’s never felt this way. Ever. He wants to be there when she wakes up tomorrow. He never wants her to leave his side again. Taking a deep breath, he gets up about to move into her bedroom.

Don't wanna wait to bring you flowers
Waste another hour
Let alone another day

This isn’t the way he wanted it to go. There was meant to be flowers and wine and a home cooked candlelit dinner that he’d slaved over for hours. There was meant to be some romance, but she’d admitted she loved him to the best of her ability, so now it was his turn and he wasn’t going to wait any longer.

Not when time had been so cruel to him already.

He stood in her doorway, watching her breathe. Her back was to him, but he knew she wasn’t asleep. She’d been burned by a taser gun, buried alive and admitted feelings she didn’t even believe in. No-one slept after that. No matter how logical they were.

“Temperance?” His voice is soft and he sees her stop breathing for a moment. He never ever wants to see her breathless again. It scares him too much.

“You read…”

He moves around to stand in front of her and kneels. She has tears in her eyes again. It shakes him to the core. She’s usually so strong. Moving her hair off her face, he smiles reassuringly.

“I didn’t want to, but yeah, I read it.” His voice is barely a whisper as he slides the note back into her hand.

“I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable but-” He presses a finger to her lips, effectively silencing her. He doesn’t know why it worked. She never usually shuts up so easily.

“You didn’t.” He takes a deep breath and his chest constricts. All the ‘what if’s’ pass through his mind, but by now he’s skilled at shutting things out. “I love you. I really, really do.”

And before she can answer, he presses his lips to hers.

His heart is almost bursting from his ribcage and this feeling that’s inside him is threatening to break loose and consume them both. God, he’s waited so long, and she’s here alive and breathing in his arms. It’s almost more than he can take. He feels a tear slip down one of their cheeks, and it has to be hers, because he is far too happy to cry. He pulls away softly and extremely reluctantly.

“Temperance? What’s-” He’s cut off by her lips on his again and he smiles into the kiss. He didn’t want this to be this intense tonight, but her tongue is insistent and he opens his mouth to her, giving her what she needs. After a while, she’s tugging at his shirt and he stops.

“Bones…not tonight.” Her shoulders drop as much as they can when she’s lying down and she takes a breath to calm herself. He continues.

“One day. I promise…but this needs to be slow, and right now, you need sleep.”

“Booth, I want to be able to say it. I want to believe in-” He cuts her off with a light kiss.

“I know. And I know it’ll take time, but I’m not going anywhere.”

“Thankyou.” She whispers it, and he almost misses it, but he smiles.

“No. I’m not the one that needs to be thanked.” He presses a kiss to her forehead. “I’m so glad you’re alive Bones.”

“As am I.” She smiles, then sobers. “Would it be too much to ask for you to stay?”

“Of course not Bones.”

He walks around the other side of her bead and takes off this shoes and lime green and blue striped socks. The minute he gets in, he can feel her arms around him. He’s never pictured her as a cuddler, but he knows it’s what they both need tonight.

And whether she believes in love or not, he’s always going to be here to save her either from a serial killer or herself. And he’s always going to love her.

Just lean on my shoulder
It's not over till it's over